CARE Ratings is one of the leading credit rating agencies in India. It has emerged as the leading agency in many risk rating segments, including manufacturing, infrastructure, and the financial sector, among others. The organization has an established track record of rating companies over almost three decades and has had a pivotal role in developing bank debt and capital market instruments, including CPs, corporate bonds and debentures, and structured credit.
Cloud Access Security Broker (CASB) – Confidently adopt cloud applications and services without sacrificing security.
Next Gen Secure Web Gateway (SWG) – The foundation for SSE web and cloud inline security providing threat and data protection.
ZTNA Next – Connect users anywhere to private resources ensuring fast and direct application connectivity and superior user experience.
Improved access policies with granular user behavior insight
More secure BYOD through visibility into unmanaged devices
Better data loss awareness, with fewer false positive alerts
Over the past two years, CARE Ratings has upgraded its Information Security Management System (ISMS) framework to support online rating operations. As a result of these efforts, the company has enabled its entire business operations to run smoothly during the COVID19 epidemic, with all its employees working from home.
Network security and data loss were a concern, however. “Once employees were working from home, we no longer had much visibility into how they were accessing cloud apps and browsing the internet,” says Shiju Rawther. In addition to reducing the risk of malware infection from unmanaged cloud apps and websites, the CARE Ratings IT team needed to prevent the movement of data into unmanaged apps, as well as data downloads to personal devices from risky Microsoft 365 SaaS apps.
CARE Ratings also wanted to improve the user experience when employees accessed key business applications on the private corporate network. They wanted to enable users to access all the apps they needed as soon as they turned on their systems.
Once employees were working from home, we no longer had much visibility into how they were accessing cloud apps and browsing the internet.
After evaluating multiple vendors, CARE Ratings chose the Netskope Security Cloud platform for its advantages in the following areas:
Netskope Professional Services worked with a leading Netskope partner to deploy the Netskope CASB and Next Generation Secure Web Gateway (NG SWG). The Netskope client was installed on all end user systems, with connectors in the corporate data centers providing secure access to cloud applications through Netskope Private Access (NPA). An integral part of the Netskope Security Cloud, NPA is a ZTNA solution for hybrid IT environments. Netskope Professional Services provided guidance to fine tune the Zero Trust access policies, and thanks to the close cooperation between the Netskope and partner teams, the system went live within the expected timeframe.
With Netskope’s application and risk awareness, we have been able to tighten access restrictions, based on the risk of the apps themselves and the role-based profiles of the users accessing them.
Using the Netskope Security Cloud solution, CARE Ratings became aware of multiple unmanaged apps that posed potential security risks. “We identified more than 600 applications that were being accessed within the CARE Ratings setup,” says Shiju Rawther. “With Netskope’s application and risk awareness, we have been able to tighten access restrictions, based on the risk of the apps themselves and the role-based profiles of the users accessing them.”
In addition to monitoring web and cloud app access from managed devices, Netskope also gives CARE Ratings’ IT staff complete visibility of Microsoft 365 application access from unmanaged devices. This enables the IT staff to define granular access controls, so users can enjoy the flexibility of using their preferred devices to access the applications they need, without putting corporate data assets at risk.
“Our user experience on collaboration and Microsoft 365 apps has improved after migrating to the Netskope platform,” Shiju says. “They have seamless and transparent experience while accessing SaaS as well as private network applications as soon as their system is logged on.”
CARE Ratings has also gained a more accurate picture of its data loss, and its Business/IT Compliance team receives fewer false-positive alerts about potential violations.